When will we be unafraid to be near a hillslope?

The mudslide at the Karak Highway last Wednesday that blocked traffic in both directions is a sharp reminder that the hazards of the wet season are back with us again.

While there was thankfully no loss of lives this time, there is some property damage and significant economic loss due to the disruption of traffic along this major arterial road.

An incident like this naturally revives public concern over the state of hillslope maintenance not just at the site of the disaster but all over the country because of the extensive devastation that has been seen in previous episodes.

A common thread that runs through the many instances of hillslope disasters is the failure of oversight mechanisms to trigger preventive measures that could have averted a calamity.

This points to unsatisfactory safety consciousness in our public services that is abetted by a culture of complacency in the broader population.

Compounding this malaise is the poor state of accountability in our public institutions that affects not just the safety culture but can escalate the severity of disasters and the losses that result from them.

Therefore, we need to recognise firstly that an environmental disaster like the Karak mudslide must not be seen in isolation, but should trigger a broader examination of the maintenance culture of the relevant institutions, the need for a ground shift towards greater transparency and accountability and the development of societal consciousness in terms of a sense of responsibility towards public safety and environmental integrity.

At the time of writing, there were more questions than answers about the causes of the mudslide, and an official report would only be due a fortnight from the event.

For instance, there was a curious admission by Works Minister Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof that logs that were washed out in the mudslide could be a sign of forest clearing, but he “cannot confirm that it is logging,” he was quoted as saying by the Star.

For additional measure, Bernama reported the Pahang Forestry Department director Datuk Mohd Paiz Kamaruzaman as saying that no logging activities had been conducted in the area, including in the area of the Tenaga Nasional Berhad transmission line route from Bentong, Pahang to Lenggeng, Negri Sembilan.

"I can assure you that there are no logging activities in the area,” he said.

On the other hand, an environmental group has claimed that uncontrolled logging has been going on right in the Lentang Recreational Forest.

Pertubuhan Pelindung Khazanah Alam Malaysia (Peka) president, Puan Sri Shariffa Sabrina Syed Akil said she saw uncontrolled logging activities in the forest area following the building of the Tenaga Nasional Malaysia passageway from Bentong to Lenggeng, The Malaysian Insider reported.

It quoted her as saying that protest letters had been sent to the state government and the problem highlighted through the mass media, but enforcement had been lax, resulting in more forest land being illegally cleared although it was a water catchment area.

Such contradictions illustrate the need for independent assessment of natural resource management practices, including forestry, to be adopted as the benchmark for public accountability.

Until we accept a much higher level of transparency and accountability than is currently evident, it is difficult to see blatant discrepancies between official statements and ground observations being easy to reconcile.

The Star also reported the Fire and Rescue Department as saying that the landslide was not caused by logging activities but rather due to an overflow of the water catchment.

The department’s deputy director-general (operations) Datuk Soiman Jahid reportedly said that several days of heavy rains caused the catchment to overflow and to pick up sediment, turning it into the mudslide that blanketed part of the expressway.

While a catchment overflow may explain the immediate cause of the incident, a holistic perspective of all contributory factors to a slope collapse may be useful in order to complete the picture.

Further, besides focusing on the root causes of the disaster, attention must be directed to the development of a robust maintenance culture at all levels of the administration.

It has been pointed out repeatedly that we have no shortage of government committees and special teams that are set up to address the most pressing public interest issues, but the chronic problems that are holding the country back hardly show that these efforts have produced lasting improvement.

With impressive instruments of governance ranging from a Cabinet committee on hillslope development to tasks forces at the local council level, we ought to already be in a rather sound position in terms of hillslope safety.

Yet the latest disaster goes to show that we cannot assume that any hillslope that we may be near to is unlikely to collapse because the authorities assure us that no logging has been taking place there.

Whatever the reasons that are finally given in the official report as the causes of the Karak mudslide, they will probably not stop us from worrying whether the next downpour will send another hillslope cascading down on our heads. – November 14, 2015.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.